Funding arrangements
Funding arrangements between government and non-profit organisations take many forms along a continuum from conditional grants to highly specified contracts.
In general, grants are designed to support an organisation or an activity rather than to buy goods or services. A grant programme can operate on any scale, from very small and localised grants to extremely large grants to support major infrastructure projects. Government grants come with expectations of performance ranging from those that have substantial conditions attached to those with very few conditions. What needs to be achieved should be the main focus for both grantmaker and grantseeker. The nature of the expected outcome may lead to some grants requiring more substantial and complex conditions.
Purchase arrangements also come in many forms. In some instances, contracts offer the parties an opportunity to negotiate and agree a result and how work will be done to achieve the result. In other cases, the funder (purchaser) has a clear set of goods or services in mind and relies on market-based procurement.1
1 The Office of the Auditor-General provides detailed descriptions of categories of funding arrangements in “Public Sector purchases, grants and gifts: Managing funding arrangements with external parties”. Available at http://www.oag.govt.nz/2008/funding-arrangements
